The Fall and Rise of Avery Johnson
by carapoop
Summary: This is a "what if" story that tracks the path of Sgt. Avery Johnson through the course of the Insurrection in a world where the Covenant don't exist. The first 2 chapters are fairly short but the later ones do get a bit longer. I'm new to the site and this is the first story I've ever written start to finish so criticism of any kind is very much welcome. Enjoy.
1. Chapter 1

**January 1st, 2526: **

Avery Johnson woke up on the floor, reeking of Harvest corn whiskey and the vomit he seemed to have unloaded down the front of his shirt the night before. Blinking away a painful but familiar head ache, he shuffled into the bathroom and puked - not buckets, just enough to let him stand up straight.

As he had predicted when he'd been shipped here, there were no Innies on Harvest. The only enemy he had on-world was Byrne, and he was one Johnson couldn't kill. Not unless he wanted to end up somewhere even shittier than the massive pile of wheat and corn he got stranded on. It bothered him, not to be able to kill his enemies. He had many, but they were all very far away, hurting the people he said he would protect. Instead of fighting on the front lines, he was out here, training idiot farm boys and catching cold glares from Byrne. He wanted to _fight_, goddammit.

But as he looked down at his M6F side arm, resting next to the nearly-finished bottle of whiskey, he realized that he was full of shit. He didn't want to fight. He wanted to die. If only he could get back to the fight, _then_, he could step right in front of an Innie bullet and bite it.

He was too scared to do it himself.

"Happy fucking New Year", croaked Johnson to himself. He polished off the whiskey and stumbled out the door.


	2. Chapter 2

**March 23, 2529:**

Johnson's second transfer request of the year had just been denied. _Ridiculous_, he thought, _fucking ridiculous. The Innies nuke New Paris and they want to keep me rotting on the shit pile!_ He slammed back his shot, grabbed the bottle, and poured himself another. He was in Johann's pub, which was fairly crowded, but he was alone; he always was.

The screens in the bar were playing nothing but footage of the attack. The talking heads on the news hadn't shut up about it for 4 days, and they showed no signs of stopping.

_ "10 million dead... ...tizens concerned for their safety... ...dreds of thousands took to the streets of New York in prote... ...can the Insurrection be stopped?"_

_ Of course it can_, thought Johnson. _In fact, it's really fucking simple: give them their god damn planets and they'll go home. Unless you want to keep mopping up your own blood._ He smirked as the image of a HIGHCOM officer trying to wipe the streets clean with a worn-out mop played through his mind.

His smile faded when he realized that no HIGHCOM brass-hole would be doing anything as menial or degrading. No, this war was paid for by the young men and women, on both sides, who had signed up to be meat for the grinder. By fathers whose only crimes had been to take their kids to a Jim Dandy's for lunch after the zoo. By children who only knew their red soil for a few golden years before their minds were extinguished by a bomb so hot, so powerful it had left nothing but a 5-mile wide glass scar on the face of Mars.

He ended the war the only way he knew how. He took another shot.

_ "...iral Margaret Parangosky announced today that ONI would begin new initiatives "to bring the Insurrectionists to their knees within the year". When pressed for details, she decl..."_

He passed out at the bar again.


	3. Chapter 3

**August 7, 2531:**

Yvette's Pourhouse was dark and empty, save the lone shadow slouched in a corner booth.

_ TTHHHHHHHHOOOOMMMMMMMM_

The sound of rattling glass echoed through the deserted pub. The sudden, muted _POP_ of a bottle breaking behind the bar marked the end of the cacophony, and silence settled like dust.

The man in the corner booth took a swig from a cheap bottle.

Whiskey no longer tasted like anything to Johnson, at least when he drank it. He found this strange because when he vomited, the taste was nearly overpowering. He didn't think it _that_ strange though. He didn't think about much of _anything_ these days, except for his own death. That was a thought that unfolded in his mind a thousand different ways.

He could step in front of a harvester's blades.

Or eat a bullet from his trusty M6F.

He could find a way onto the space elevator, ride it all the way up, and jump right off the top. This last one appealed to him, and he imagined the peace he would feel as he plummeted to his end.

It wasn't going to happen that way though. He took another drink from the bottle, pulling a deep gulp of the burning amber liquid. No, it was going to be an Innie that shot him down. _It's happening today_, he thought, and a smile spread across his lips. He drank again, nearly killing the bottle.

_ KHHHHAAAACHHHOOOOOOMMMMMMM_

The windows on the east wall of the bar exploded inwards in a beautiful spray of fragmented glass. Gunshots and screams could be heard now, from the same direction as the explosion. Johnson's smile fled, and he sat up a bit straighter. He polished off the whiskey and dropped the bottle onto the booth, then pulled out his M6F.

About 6 months after the destruction of New Paris, Insurrectionist leaders began dropping like flies. Johnson still remembered the first: Staffan Sentzke, one of the highest-profile Innie commanders, disappeared from his corvette _The Hand That Feeds_ in orbit above Venezia. Every single crew member aboard the ship was found dead, either asphyxiated or killed with their own weapons . All of the ship's magazines had been jettisoned, and its slipspace drive sabotaged. When the boarding party tried to access the ship's network, the reactor overloaded, wiping out _The Hand_ and everyone on it.

Officially, none of this was true. These reports were just rumors that slipped from the mouths of Innie grunts and found their way to Harvest. On the news, Parangosky announced simply that ONI had neutralized Sentzke in an undisclosed location and planned to continue hunting the rebel leadership until they surrendered their cause. Within a year of that announcement, 103 high-ranking Innie leaders had been assassinated, though almost none of the bodies were recovered. Many of them had been taken from Innie strongholds, and word began to spread on both sides of the war. Some said that ONI had discovered a way to make a person invisible. Others claimed they were teleporting spooks right into the bedrooms of their targets. There were whispers about AI-controlled robots, shapeshifters, and super soldiers. A common joke spread that ONI was simply hiring back the ghosts of dead agents at half pay.

Johnson knew which whispers to believe. They'd done their best to turn him into one of these ghosts, and failed. He shuddered at the thought that they might have finally succeeded.

_BBBBBBBOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMCHHHHHHHHH_

The eastern wall of the bar collapsed inward, showering Johnson with bits of woods and steel. He armed his pistol and tried to focus. He wished he had another bottle.

Within a year after ONI began its offensive, the rebels were on their heels. Unable to effectively lead the war while simultaneously defending themselves from capture, the Innie leadership made a risky decision: decentralize their military efforts. Land-based garrisons were maintained to hold sympathetic worlds, but the ragtag Innie fleet spread out across the stars with the goal of picking off the most vulnerable of UNSC worlds. The push toward Earth had required monumental coordination and leadership, and ONI was preying on that. The Innies decided to turn outward, and soon undefended backwater worlds started to receive visits from marauding freighters and frigates whose only orders were to sow as much destruction and confusion in the Outer Colonies as possible.

Today they'd found Harvest, and Johnson couldn't have been happier.

He saw a militiaman run past the bar, unarmed. It looked like Healy but he couldn't really tell, nor did he care. Johnson had been discharged from the Marines 10 months ago. Something about being drunk. He couldn't quite remember.

Another militia grunt appeared, but she was walking backwards and firing her weapon. He heard her magazine empty, and watched as she caught a bullet in her left shoulder while reloading. She pulled out her sidearm, but was shot dead before she could pull the trigger. Now was his chance.

He walked toward the ruined wall, took a deep breath, and looked around the corner. His vision was blurry; he was sure it was the booze but didn't admit it to himself. He saw three armed men wearing brown fatigues walking towards Yvette's. They were about 30 meters away. Johnson stepped out from behind the wall and began taking aim. He fired at the lead trooper, missing wildly. His second and third shots also failed to connect. He was drunker than he had realized.

Before he could fire a fourth shot, he felt an intense heat in his right thigh.

He tried to look down at it, only to realize he was on his back.

He squeezed the trigger again but his gun was no longer in his hand.

The air smelled like piss and smoke, and his mouth tasted like dirt and vomit.

Something blocked the sunlight, and he started to laugh.


	4. Chapter 4

**February 27, 2532:**

It had been years since he'd been on Reach. It still smelled just like he remembered, sweeter than Earth's air and just a hint piney. Some found it revolting; he sucked it deep into his lungs and held it.

_I'm not happy about it, Jacob, but don't for one second sit there and tell me I can't be proud of them._

He took a quick look through the scope of his SRS99-AM. The road was still deserted.

_The Insurrection is scattered to the wind. We took back 3 worlds in the last month alone. Don't tell me they're not working._

He'd already known that. But he was very excited, and more than a little nervous.

_ People can say what they will. I know the truth. So do you. But the rest of them? They're just talking._

He exhaled and sat back. He knew he had another 134 seconds until the mark was in the target area.

_And what would you have had me do?! The work was right there, right in front of me. I saw it immediately. The problem, and the solution. It was my only choice!_

He chewed an expensive cigar and realized how strange it was, to be here like this. A year ago he had been sure he was going to die in some filthy bar on Harvest, just another drunk buried far from his home.

_Those children were our only answer! They're lives against billions... How can you sit there and condemn me?!_

The strangeness was fleeting. He knew deep down he had been on this path his entire life. He saw it now. It made him smile.

_You and the rest of this pathetic species! This project brought us back from the brink, you know that better than anyone._

His satisfaction was interrupted by the arrival of the mark. He looked back down the scope and found the car.

_They know it too. That's why we're going back out. We can widen the pool this time. A lot has changed in the last 7 years. And we don't even need as many._

A black-haired man was driving. He was a lieutenant in the Navy. Unimportant.

_Fine, don't come with me. They'll assign me another ship. But don't act like your hands are clean. If this disgusts you so much, you could stop it. You could kill me right now._

The mark had been crying. She was still visibly upset. Unimportant.

_You all act like you're innocent, like you wish I'd never done it. You're all god damn hypocr-_

Boss gave him whiskey when he got back. It tasted fantastic.


	5. Chapter 5

**November 17, 2533:**

The cloak hung low over Johnson's eyes as he approached the Pelican. The Marines sitting inside were alert but not tense; this world was, after all, technically sympathetic to the UEG. There were 41 armed Marines in all, including the ones who had come to meet the ship.

He was about 100 meters away.

The last 2 years had been some of the most grueling, backbreaking years of Johnson's life. He trained hard, every single day, with 5 of the most horrendous human beings he had ever had the displeasure of meeting. He'd killed many men, almost as many as he had for the other side, back in his last life. He had been made into a blade, a scalpel, a laser whose precision was rivaled only by its lethality.

He _knew_ that it was all for a purpose. He was on a journey that started the day he ended that bitch on Reach. It would end the day he freed the last of her ghosts, her abominations. They were an affront, stripped of their humanity so they could save the rest of us. The hypocrisy was clearly lost on the UNSC, but he saw it.

Johnson had almost had it happen to him once, but they'd failed before they completed his transformation. He was pure now, a human killing machine.

"The UNSC are cowards. They fight us with children whose bodies are fused with machine. We will show them, _you_ will show them, that the Insurrection is human, _wholly_ human, and we will not be intimidated by mutilated slaves. The very existence of these things reaffirms the necessity of this rebellion. Tomorrow, you will earn the right to become the sword of the Insurrection, or you will die."

His boss had told him that, right before the mission. Those words hung in his head when his shuttle left the _Fork in the Road_, and had stayed with him all through his sleepless night. This was his last test.

He was about 50 meters away now. It was a clear, cloudless day, and the spaceport was crowded. There was only one way out for him. It would land in 12 seconds.

Something lurched up inside him. _Don't do this! He's lying, they're all lying! You're no different than the gho-_

He buried that thought deep within his mind. It wouldn't help him with the task at hand. He was 20 meters out.

At 15 meters, he threw the cloak away and started sprinting.

Johnson was kicking the closest Marine in the throat before her mind had even registered what was happening. Before he even heard the _gurglgurgle_ of her last breath, he had a forearm in his hands and he was snapping it. Two jagged, glistening bones was protruding from the brown flesh he held, and without thinking he ripped the man's hand off and drove the bones through the left eye of a third Marine who had punched Johnson in the back of the head.

He didn't grab any of their weapons. This test had rules, and he knew them.

There were still 18 Marines inside the Pelican, and 20 more bearing down. Instinct threw him into the troop bay with them.

Johnson blacked out.

_"Terror today as an entire platoon of Marines were killed by an unarmed and as-yet unidentified man in the Alltroph spaceport on Boundary. Security footage was conspicuously sabotaged, but eye-witness reports tell of an incredibly muscular man killing dozens of Marines in hand-to-hand combat. All accounts indicate that he acted alone in this attack. The assailant then hijacked a Pelican and escaped without pursuit. ONI has blamed the attack on the Insurrection but no claim has been released yet..."_

When he woke up, he was back on the _Fork_, in his bunk, alone. He was sore, and thirsty. Sitting up, he found a bottle of Reach whiskey with a note attached.

"You passed."


	6. Chapter 6

**July 19, 2534:**

_taptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptap_

Johnson was excited. And nervous. And, surprisingly, scared. He hadn't felt _that_ in years, and he welcomed the long lost emotion with glee.

_I feel like I'm on a blind date_, he thought to himself. In a lot of ways, he _was_ on a blind date. He'd never met the person he was waiting for, had never even seen their face before. He didn't even know if it would be a man or a woman. That didn't concern him, though. That wasn't why he was nervous.

_taptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptap_

He did know _what_ he was meeting.

He'd met a lot of nasty motherfuckers in his years with NavSpecWar. The motherfuckers had been even nastier in ORION.

But the ghost coming for him was something well, well beyond that.

Boss had made sure Johnson knew that. They'd spent hours together reviewing the ghosts' kidnappings and attacks, trying to tease apart their strengths and weaknesses. After months of obsessing, they determined that weakness was not a word easily applied to their foes. It was _this_ realization that had been the key for them: the ghosts feared no human. Their strength was their weakness. The Innies had never bagged a ghost, and Boss decided they would play this to their advantage.

So here was Johnson. Whatever was coming for him, it expected to find a crown. It didn't know that a Sword was waiting.

_taptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptap_

Boss was a very smart man. Johnson didn't know his name; he didn't know anyone that did. What he _did_ know was that the Insurrection had a problem, and Boss knew the solution. He had been the one to reveal the truth about the ghosts, that they were kidnapped children forced into a life of combat. He had known the location of Johnson's mark on Reach, and her importance.

"She was their mother", Boss had told him a year after Johnson had killed her. He hadn't known who she was when he'd pulled the trigger. "It was of the utmost importance to kill the mother first. Now they can't breed. We just need to hunt down the survivors until they're extinct."

Boss knew a lot about how the ghosts had been made, too. This he had never told Johnson. He had overheard it while Boss and some officers had been watching him spar. Johnson heard their conversation from almost 100 meters away; his hearing had been improving over the last few months.

It was probably because he had stopped drinking.

_taptaptaptaptaptaptapta-_

Gunshots now, and screams. His date was here.

"We need you to take extra care to protect its shell. The shell is very important. The meat we can understand even if it looks nothing like a person, but the shell _has_ to be in one piece. We can't figure out how to beat them without it. Do you understand me Johnson?"

He understood.

He was armed with only 2 blades. _Most men in my position would use these on themselves,_ he thought with a grim satisfaction. He could do this.

Johnson had always been a thick, muscular man, but he was downright massive now. He weighed 326 pounds, all of it muscle. He'd been so damn _hungry_ these last few months, and they just kept feeding him. At first he'd been worried that his increased size would affect his finesse, but his added strength made him quicker and quieter than ever.

It was almost _certainly_ because he had stopped drinking.

The door began to shake, and then bend outward. It was 8 centimeters of Titanium-A.

He stood.

Time slowed. One blink lasted a year. He spent a decade exhaling.

The door flexed heavily and then flew outward. A taser's electrode shot through the threshold and planted itself in Johnson's chest plate. He pressed a button on his hip and sent 2 amperes of current back through the cable.

He started sprinting toward the ghost. An MA5B was being raised to him. He heard its inner mechanisms beginning to work just as he smacked it out of the way with his right hand. An instant later his head was ringing from a lightning-fast right hook. Johnson started spinning to the right, acting much more hurt than he was.

This was his chance. He started stumbling away from the ghost, trying to draw another strike.

It worked. The ghost's right hand was approaching Johnson's already-shattered jaw. He waited until the last possible instant, then grabbed the ghost's arm with his right and pulled it across his chest. The back of the ghost's neck was exposed. Johnson's left hand plunged a blade deep into the base of the skull, between the helmet and back plate, then tilted the blade up.

He spent an hour pinned under the heaped shell. It was the most comfortable bed in the world.

The fight had lasted 4 seconds.


	7. Chapter 7

**March 15, 2539:**

_ He wished, more than anything, that he could be the one to do it. His family, his entire, family, was dead because of that man. And he was here, and that man was very far away._

Mac was bored. Sergeant Helms had told him this morning that they'd be escorting The Colonel in a convoy to New Tyne. Mac had done this job a million times before, for The Colonel and every other officer that came to Venezia. It helped that the drive was beautiful, following a wide and fast river with rocky banks that led to the feet of hills laden with dense green foliage. The road stuck to the tops of the hills, occasionally riding the edge of a sharp drop.

But beauty has a way of dulling after 500 repetitions, so Mac was bored and he was stuck with that.

_He knew he had to be here, on Venezia. He knew it was the only way to bring the bastard down._

Something caught the corner of his eye, inside the main gate. He stopped leaning on the truck, stood up straight.

"It can't be."

He was nearly seven and a half feet tall.

His armor was a deep, amber red. In many places it was darker, nearly blood red; as he got closer to Mac, he realized that these were dents and burn scars. The visor on his head was a sickly, reflective yellow.

He we carrying a battle rifle. He had multiple large blades stuck across his armor.

He was terrifying.

_He wasn't looking forward to the fight he was facing. This Sword was the most dangerous combatant in the Insurrection._

_Still, he was deeply sure that he would make it._

_They'd all been._

Mac thought he would attempt to salute as Johnson approached him, but the result was an awkward stumble back as the massive cyborg entered the passenger seat of a truck.

His truck.

Fuck.

_He knew the sword was not responsible for the lives it took. No sword was._

_He knew the mission to eliminate the real culprit was well underway. He hoped they would succeed._

_And he knew that his time had run short. He would face the hunter soon. He had one way out._

Mac snapped out of his stupor and ran to the car.

"H-hi, sir..."

"...New Tyne spaceport?"

Johnson nodded. The truck rolled forward, preceded and flanked by fancy new M12 Warthogs, stolen months earlier from an unfortunate platoon of UNSC Army troopers.

_Show time. He hated this; it felt almost scripted. He knew it was._

Mac began to relax as he drove his familiar route. It was still, after all, beautiful; and he was certainly not bored. He was sitting mere inches away from a perfect soldier.

No, he was not bored. He was freshly terrified as he fully processed the lethality of his passenger.

But again, the trip soothed him. He couldn't do much else but focus on the road anyway. Small talk was not an option.

Mac's mind drifted to stray wonderings about the Sword's destination. His mission was probably difficult; he was probably going to single-handedly hijack a UNSC destroyer or something along those lines.

Mac slowly realized his importance. The Sword's mission was in _his_ hands. He had to keep him safe on the trip.

The were coming up on the river. He straightened up and looked ahead: he thought he saw someone on the cliffs across the wate-

_CHHHTTTHHHHHHOOOOOOOOMMMMMMCCCHHHHHH_

Mac cut the wheel hard to the left as the burning hulk of the lead Warthog tumbled off the road on the right.

He looked up and just barely saw the ne-

_PPPOOOOOMMMMMCHHHHH_

He was guiding the truck with only the front wheels.

The back wheels crashed back down and spun the back end left and then hard right. He straightened it out and slammed on the brakes. He stopped 10 meters short of the edge of the road.

He heard the truck door open. His passenger was out and already leaping down the steep banks to the water. He opened the door and reached fo-

_Just me and him now._


	8. Chapter 8

Johnson was across the river 10 seconds after the first rocket explosion. He had his BR55 shouldered, and was making his way through the woods towards the base of the cliffs. He saw nothing, but he knew his quarry was further up the hill beyond the cliffs, taking a higher position. He was sure he would kill the last ghost.

_or just let him kill you out no one will know_

His problem was that he was _too _sure of himself. He craved the fight. He _needed_ to hunt the ghosts. And he was good at it.

But when had he become so good at it? Why? Why was he fighting these people, _with _the Insurrection?

_he tricked you he played you how can you be so stupid_

He felt it again. That nagging in his brain. Words too quiet to hear. Nearly a voice. Like listening to a radio turned down too low, or overhearing whispers in another room.

But he knew what it was saying.

Johnson had felt it creep up in him, slowly, after Boss had _really_ started training him. For years he'd been telling himself that his strength, his agility, his reflexes were the result of this training and his sobriety. But someone else had an opinion on the matter. And Johnson couldn't shut him up.

He reached the base of the cliff, clamped his battle rifle onto his back. The face was 20 meters high, 25 further down. Johnson crouched low and leaped 15 meters. He grabbed a small outcropping with armored fingertips and propelled himself to the top. He was re-armed and gone without a sound.

Deep down he knew he'd been fucked over. Taken advantage of. He wasn't stupid. It was the truth.

_of course it is it has been from the day they took you_

But only deep down. He knew other truths. One of them was that the UNSC had created monsters out of children and turned them loose on the Insurrection. Johnson had freed those children, one by one, and saved thousands in the process. The war would end soon.

_you're one of the monsters_

He heard his foe. The king ghost was doubling back, finally, for the fight. Johnson knew he would.

They'd fought before. Twice. Both times Johnson had claimed a ghost. Once, he'd almost died himself. He knew this man was more dangerous than himself. It would be an interesting fight.

Johnson found himself at the top of the hill, in a large grove of thin, tall trees. He had the illusion of being able to see for quite a distance around him. He felt naked and exposed. He listened.

_just sit down and end this for us_

His left arm reached down, plucked a grenade from his thigh. His thumb hovered over the button. He heard him.

He turned, armed the grenade and threw it. As his arm was releasing the explosive he caught 3 rounds hard in his chest plate. A fourth glanced off the left side of his helmet.

He was down. His gun was gone. His heart hurt. He might have pissed in his suit. He had.

He was up.

_stay down_

He heard the grenade explode and took off toward the falling debris. The ghost was scrambling up, turning his weapon toward Johnson. He had to close the gap. He leaped.

He felt another round punch him, this time in the shoulder. He hit the ghost hard. They started rolling down the hill, snapping the thin trees like match sticks. They seperated. Johnson crashed onto a log and bounced up, skipping down the hill. He tucked, twisted, kicked, planted.

Johnson had rolled all the way back to the cliffs. He was facing the hill, scanning it. He didn't see the ghost. Few ever did.

He turned around in time to catch the ghost's right arm with his left. The blade was practically leaping at Johnson's throat, but now he was holding the ghost's right wrist. He pulled hard on it, taking the ghost off his balance long enough for Johnson to push away. He was pulling out a blade, he was pouncing, they were rolling. Johnson maneuvered on top of his foe, stabbed his right arm toward the ghost's throat, caught a knee to the groin, flipped over the ghost and onto his back. He rolled as a fusion-powered boot slammed into the dirt. He pivoted, still on the ground, and swept out the ghost. His leg hit nothing. He stood.

They were facing each other, 5 meters apart. Johnson unsheathed a second blade. No one moved.

In that instant he knew the truth. He really knew it, like he had back on Harvest a lifetime ago. He faced his reflection and he hated it. He wanted to _kill_ it, he wanted to choke the life from the ghost's eyes. From his own eyes. They were the same.

He had become his worst enemy.

He had always been his worst enemy. From the day he joined the Corps. The day he volunteered for ORION. The day at the Jim Dandy. The day he agreed to work for Boss. The day he put on this filthy shell.

He had spent his life fighting for others instead of himself. He'd been broken on Harvest, destroyed. Boss told him it was part of the plan, that he had a _purpose_. But it was a lie. He'd been used.

Boss didn't feel bad for the ghosts. He hated them. Hated their perfection, their lethality. He'd hated their mother, too. Perhaps most of all. So he had taken a broken man and, from the remains, built a monster. He had turned Johnson into an abomination, a twisted, vengeful simalcrum. He was the distorted reflection of the perfect soldier. He was a response, a reaction, a big "fuck you" to people he didn't even know. He was done with it.

It was time to retire.

Johnson smiled. It had been years since he'd smiled. He almost laughed.

He dove forward, made it look good. Made it look close. But he knew, and the ghost knew. They'd both done the dance too many times before; it was easy now to spot a faker.

Johnson didn't care. His throat felt warm, his lips were wet, and then, he finally slept.


	9. Epilogue

_Rogue UNSC Army Colonel James Ackerson was assassinated yesterday in a massive operation undertaken by ONI. He is widely known as the force behind the resurgence of the Insurrection, and the creator of the so-called 'Sword of the Insurrection', a genetically-modified super-soldier that has terrorized UNSC worlds for nearly a decade. Ackerson disappeared from UNSC-controlled space in November of 2530. The official reason for his defection is classified, though many believe that disagreements with ONI caused a rift between Ackerson and the..._

Parangosky switched off the screen and turned her chair around. She faced a tall, graying man. He was bruised. His lips were swollen. His was wearing handcuffs and ankle restraints. Two massive ODSTs breathed down his neck.

"Uncuff him," and they did.

"Leave." They were alone now.

"James, take a seat. No need to be so serious. You've been away for a very long time, and you've done a lot since you left."

He said nothing. Just stared into her eyes.

"You've got me all wrong. You're not in trouble. I'm impressed. _We're_ impressed. Now sit, please. We need to discuss your future."

Slowly, he sat. They finally listened.


End file.
